


Promises in Silence

by empirium



Category: The Hobbit (2012), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Durincest, M/M, Vampire!Kili, slight bloodplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-01
Updated: 2013-08-02
Packaged: 2017-12-10 03:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/781277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/empirium/pseuds/empirium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is difficult to let go of the dead, especially when they can still laugh, smile, and speak their minds. </p><p>Fili, meanwhile, is doing everything he can to keep Kili "alive."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

1.

It’s a stupid fight. Fili can’t even recall what they’d been fighting about, only that they had been fighting and Kili storms out of their shared house, fuming and furious. It’s hardly an hour later when the night bells starts to ring, shrill like screams in the darkness. Fili doesn’t hesitate, just grabs his coat from the rack and charges outside because Kili is wandering the streets, the idiot.

He’s still angry; dodging patrolmen in the thick fog is easy, but an unwelcomed task that fuels his irritation. He plans on giving Kili the lecture of his life.

Fili never gets the chance. As he nears a dark alley some distance away from the commotion on the street, he finds a body sprawled on the ground. He doesn’t recognize who it is at first, just sees a young, dark haired dwarf with wide, blank eyes. It doesn’t hit him until he kneels down and stares and stares and stares.

It’s his stupid, idiotic, hyper, _reckless_ brother, body cold as ice and still as stone.

==

2.

“What’s wrong with that?” Fili asks, staring at the bin.

“It is disgusting,” Kili replies, still curled up in a ball on the sofa. He must have moved since the last time Fili had seen him, since the waterskin is now in the trash. “Fili. Please?” He is looking up at Fili with big, bright eyes in a way that ensures the crumbling of Fili’s resolve.

Fili bites the inside of his mouth and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Fine,” he says after a moment. “Uncle expects me at the forge tomorrow. Don’t take too much.”

Kili bounces out of the seat he’s in, glee written plainly upon his face. He presses a cold hand to Fili’s cheek, lips tugged into a smile. “I won’t,” he says, but there is no conviction behind those words. Fili doubts that Thorin would let him sleep in tomorrow; he is always tired and woozy after a feeding session with Kili, but he had promised his uncle he would be there to help with the orders.

“Neck? Arm?” Fili asks, already knowing what Kili wants. The whites of Kili’s eyes have turned an unnatural red color, an ominous, hungry look in them that ensures this session is going to end up messy and Fili tired for days. Every time he tries to get Kili to have something that isn’t his own blood, Kili refuses on the ground that it is disgusting. Animal, man, or dwarf—none of it matters and it all tastes foul to Kili. The only time Fili can recall Kili drinking someone else’s blood is when he had first turned and desperate in hunger, he bit Thorin.

“Neck,” Kili answers with the barest hint of fangs. “Your arm is still healing from last week.”

“I have two arms,” Fili mutters as he strips off his tunic.

The moment his shirt hits the floor, Kili is on him, a hand in his hair pulling to expose his throat, the other settling on his hip to hold him still. When Kili bites down, it is painful; the sensation of teeth piercing skin is always a shock, but as time goes on and Kili feeds greedily, the pain will fade into a dull throb and then into complete numbness. It is no different this time.

Fili reaches up, slowly untangling Kili’s fingers from his hair. He must have made a noise or something to distract Kili, since he pulls off with a moist smacking sound.

Kili’s mouth is red and wet and Fili has no doubt that his neck looks for the worst.

“Sit,” Kili says, practically throwing him onto the sofa.

“Don’t get blood on it,” Fili groans as Kili straddles him. “I don’t plan to spend the next several days cleaning furniture.”

Kili only hums a response against his skin, tongue lapping at the blood dribbling down his chest. He feels the sharpness of teeth on a different spot, lower than before and piercing in the soft juncture just above his clavicle. Fili closes his eyes and does his best to remain still, ignoring the signs of an oncoming headache.

 _Greedy little bastard_ , he thinks fondly as one of Kili’s hands searches his out, intertwining their fingers together into a tight, secure hold. When Kili is finally sated, Fili is glad he’s sitting down. He is light headed and dizzy, his head pounding out a syncopated beat. He can’t tell up from down or left from right and when he opens his eyes, all he sees is Kili.

“Good?” he manages to ask.

There is a flush in Kili’s cheeks again and there is warmth in his touch.

“Amazing,” Kili replies, sounding very far away. “Go to sleep, brother. I know you’re tired.”

“Took too much,” Fili says, his words slurring together. He lets his eyes fall shut again and just before he falls into unconsciousness, he is certain he feels gentle kisses being pressed against his much abused neck.

==

3.

Kili can’t move in the sunlight; in the mornings, he would stare at the slivers of it peeping in from under the door. He never says anything, but Fili knows how much he resents not being able to be out under the sun with everyone else. Fili doesn’t mind—he’ll give up the light forever to have Kili with him, moving animatedly and talking with bright, expressive features. He’ll take Kili being a leech. He prefers it to Kili being dead.

When the sun sets, Kili likes to go out. Fili joins him sometimes when he’s not too tired from working at the forge with Thorin or not too woozy from a recent feeding session. He walks through the busiest part of the town, where the inns and the taverns have lights and windows opened, and it’s a bit like the noise during the day. Kili walks for hours sometimes and when he’s done, he goes to the training grounds in the dead of night, picking up a sword or bow and arrow to practice. Fili does his best on those nights to stay awake enough to not get hit when they spar.

“You’re exhausted,” Dwalin comments one day at training.

“No,” Fili says, too quickly.

Dwalin just gives him a look.

“Please don’t tell Thorin,” Fili pleads. “Kili, he—he won’t drink, not unless it’s me.”

Dwalin sighs explosively and carefully puts away his sword. “You’ll die if he keeps this up,” he says. “You know this. Does he?”

Fili blinks. He’s reasonably sure that Kili knows.

==

4.

Leeches are things that have spawned from the darkness, this much Fili knows from childhood bedtime stories. They are usually associated with foul deeds and dead bodies; they are night creatures that feast on the blood of unsuspecting prey. There are many stories of leeches changing forms and the only definitive way to tell a disguised leech is the give in their eyes: their sclera turns red when hungry. There is a rumor that some leeches do not have reflections, but whether that’s started by some drunken tavern bard or not, no one knows. Fili can see Kili as clear as day in a mirror and dismisses that morsel of information as nonsense.

Leeches are weak to sunlight and like fire, burns their flesh from their bones. Other ways to kill one is to decapitate it or to destroy its heart, as they’re known to heal quickly from nonfatal wounds. To prevent attacks, do not invite strangers into your home since leeches cannot enter uninvited.

Fili knows this. Fili knows all of this, but none of it helps him.

Kili is not a monster, not some creature to kill. He laughs and smiles and annoys Fili to no end with foolish questions about nothing important and he takes care of all the housework and laundry and he joins Fili—and sometimes the whole family—for dinner even though he does not consume food. He goes hunting at night instead of the day, but he only comes back with small game and they’re always still full of blood and his eyes are never red when they’re looking at the carcasses.

It’s only when it’s Fili that his eyes change and Fili doesn’t know what to do.

Do leeches have a specific diet? How often do they drink? How much blood do they normally intake? Are they all so picky like Kili or is he just a special case?

He wants Kili to live his life, unhindered by this handicap. He wants Kili to live as he would have if he hadn’t been turned.

There is nothing in all the stories and lore about the daily lives of leeches and Fili decides that he will be the first to learn it.

==

5.

When Fili returns from the forge, Kili would almost always have dinner ready for him. The first several times he’s cooked, the food tasted burnt and bland, but now, Kili is steadily getting better. He knows what combination of flavors that Fili likes, what seasonings to use and which vegetable goes best with which meat.

“Would you walk with me?” Kili asks when Fili finishes dinner.

Fili’s tired, almost excessively so, but he’s sure that Kili hasn’t stepped outside the house for days. It can’t be good for Kili to be cooped up, so he nods and agrees to go. Kili’s never asked him to accompany him before, not like this.

He finds out why the moment they walk into the streets. It’s not completely dark out yet, the last vestiges of sunlight streaking through the sky in plumes of orange, and everyone gives Kili a wide berth as he passes. Fili seethes at this, sees red when he notices the downcast slump of his brother’s shoulders.

“They don’t matter,” Fili says. “None of them do.”

Kili perks up a bit at that, but his smile is still weak and his eyes are hollow, dead. He needs another blood source aside from Fili. Fili cannot stand Kili looking like a corpse.

“Want to go spar? I bet I can beat you with one hand tied behind my back.”

Kili’s smile becomes a little wider at that. “You’ll never beat me,” he says, puffing out his chest. “I’ve always been the better fighter.”

Fili snorts and shoves at Kili’s shoulder. “I beat you last time.”

Kili shoves him back. “That’s because you cheated!”

==

6.

Thorin walks in on a particularly messy feeding session and practically hauls Kili off of him.

“No, he’s fine!” Fili yells when Thorin draws a blade. “Stop! It’s Kili!”

Kili’s eyes—previously the terrible red color—fades back normal as he stares up at their uncle fearfully. His mouth, beard, and cheeks are stained with blood.

Fili winces as he sits up, but he’s dizzy, so dizzy. The blood from the puncture wounds on his neck are overflowing, spilling down his chest in rivulets and he tries to wipe them away, but his hands are clumsy and uncoordinated. Thorin glares and sheathes his sword in one violent motion.

“Look at the state of your brother!” Thorin roars at Kili. “You will kill him!”

Fili sees Kili tense, his eyes darting in every which way until they settle on Thorin. Then, his gaze turns to Fili.

Fili can see the moment things fall into place for Kili and he tries to say something, anything to reassure Kili that he’s fine, but his words catch in his throat. Kili opens his mouth to speak, but only a croaking whisper escapes his lips: “No.” The dam breaks and the torrent comes; Kili looks at the verge of tears. “No. No. No!” He shrieks, curls back in on himself, and Fili summons up the strength from somewhere to move from the sofa to Kili’s side, legs wobbling and stumbling like a newborn foal.

“I’m alright,” he says and Kili’s eyes are beginning to turn murky red, fading, then red again.

Kili shakes his head and in a movement too fast for Fili to see, he’s gone, the front door swinging shut with a force strong enough to crack the wood.

“Why did you do that?”

He looks up at Thorin, at the steely disappointed gaze that he secretly fears, but is very annoyed with now. He’s lilting from side to side, swaying and unable to keep himself upright and he brushes away the hand that tries to help him up. He falls anyway and Thorin scoops him up like a child, settling him back against the sofa. Thorin disappears from view for a few moments and returns with a wet cloth.

“Leeches have poor impulse control, especially when they’re hungry,” Thorin says, his voice a deep rumble in his chest as he washes the drying blood away. “He’s Kili now, but when he’s feeding? There’s nothing in his mind, not anymore. He is not the brother you knew.”

Fili wants to protest, that Kili does have control, that Kili is aware of what’s happening, but his words stay in his head as his throat seizes in rebellion. Thorin gives him a look, like he knows what Fili is thinking and Fili averts his gaze.

Thorin sighs, world-weary.

==

7.

Fili hates Thorin, just a little bit, after that night. He wakes up to Kili at his bedside, miserable and quiet, so unlike what Fili is used to.

“What’s the matter?” he asks and Kili grips his hand in an almost painful hold.

“I don’t want to lose you,” Kili says. “I don’t. But it’s like Uncle says, I can’t…I can’t think when I’m hungry.” He looks torn, his hair in disarray and unpinned from its usual clasp so it falls around him like a mourning veil. “I hate this, Fili. Everyone looks at me like I’m a monster. No dwarf—nothing natural under the sun!—drinks the blood of the living. I wouldn’t hurt any of them. No one! You know that. But even Uncle is afraid of what I am.”

Kili’s eyes are frantic and terrified and Fili thinks that if his brother still had the ability to shed tears, he’d be crying.

Fili scoots over in bed and Kili curls up next to him with hitching breaths. Kili shakes and with him, the whole bed trembles. Fili wraps his arms around the lukewarm body next to him, drawing Kili tight against his chest and Kili clings to him like he has no intention of ever letting go.

“We should go after him,” Fili says into the mop that’s Kili’s hair. “We’ll force him to tell us everything there is to know about leeches. We’ll ask him if there’s a way to turn you back.”

“What do you mean?”

Kili draws back a fraction of an inch, confusion leaking from every pore.

“The one that turned you,” Fili replies. “He’s still out there. We’ll find him and gut him for every piece of information that he has.”

==

8.

Thorin forces Kili to choose another source for meals—either animals from hunts or a willing donor and as the list of donors is entirely too short and limited, Kili opts for the animals.

Fili’s just getting ready for bed when he hears Kili gagging in the kitchen and he runs in, fists up and ready for a fight, but it’s just Kili dry heaving into the bin. On the table is a dying crow with a broken wing. There’s a bite in its side, its dark feathers glistening where the wound is. Fili ignores it and goes to his brother, kneeling down and rubs soothing circles over Kili’s back until he stops his heaving.

“Maybe there’s a reason leeches don’t prey on animals,” Fili says.

Kili glares at him, his eyes tinged with red. “How do you know?”

“We never see animals as leeches. Just men, dwarves. Orc too, but I hear those are rare and foul to come across.”

Kili wrinkles his nose. “I wouldn’t bite an orc if they paid me my weight in gold.”

Fili huffs a breath of laughter and continues. “Maybe it’s the type of blood; you could be allergic. Or maybe it’s because animal blood is…a different type of food. Like horse feed. A dwarf don’t eat that, do they? So you need something else.”

Kili’s brows furrow as he thinks on it.

“Maybe?” he says finally. “The crow tastes utterly disgusting.”

Fili bumps their foreheads together and watches as Kili’s eyes fill up red. He holds up an arm and pulls back the sleeve.

“I won’t tell if you won’t,” he whispers.

Kili smiles with a hint of lengthening fangs. “Promise.”

==

9.

“Your concentration is poor and your reflexes even worse,” Dwalin declares loudly in the middle of Fili’s training session. “Go home. You’re useless today.”

“What?!” Fili exclaims, shocked. “I am not!”

Dwalin sweeps him off balance with a foot and Fili finds himself looking up at Dwalin’s gravely disappointed face.

“Go home,” Dwalin repeats with a deep sigh. His expression is unreadable and as Thorin’s right-hand man and close counsel, Fili is certain that Dwalin will tell his uncle everything. “Eat. Rest. And don’t let that brother of yours drink from you anymore. You’re wasting away from blood loss.”

“No,” Fili insists, getting to his feet. “I’m fine. Let us continue.”

“There’s nothing I can teach you until your strength returns,” Dwalin says resolutely. He’s already stepping out of the training grounds, putting his practice sword away on the shelf with the rest. They were all stacked neatly in a precarious pile that looked as if it would fall over any moment, but even with the addition of Dwalin’s sword, the it didn’t fall.

“Go home, lad.”

Fili stares at Dwalin’s retreating back, feeling dread pool in his stomach. It’s still too early, just several hours after noon—and yet, he feels Dwalin’s words cleanly. Standing upright is a chore and staying awake is a phenomenal task. He needs to recuperate desperately.

He puts his practice swords away and nearly knocks over the pile on the shelf. It sways, but doesn’t fall and Fili lets out a small sigh of relief. He trudges back to the home he and Kili shares and wonders what he’ll say to Kili.

The truth, maybe, because it’s not like they both didn’t know the reality of it; Kili’s appetite for only Fili’s blood is draining the life from him, literally and metaphorically. Lying, as pretty and useless as it’d be, also crosses Fili’s mind, but he’s sure that Kili will see through him in an instant.

He opens the front door as quietly as he can and steps through the threshold and is greeted by the most unexpected sight.

Thorin is there, sitting at the kitchen table with his forearm bared. Kili sits next to him, paused in mid-bite. The moment he sees Fili, his eyes loses their red luster and his fangs retract. He looks immensely relieved from having to feed from Thorin.

Thorin, on the other hand, is thunderous and angry.

“What happened?” he demands because he knows Fili’s supposed to be training with Dwalin now. He knows. Is that why he’s here, at this odd hour in the day? “You’re back early.”

“I’m tired,” Fili says, shutting the door behind him. “Dwalin let me go.”

“Go, then,” Thorin grunts and with a huge hand, forces Kili back into his seat when he gets up. “You will not drink from your brother, do you understand me? I know the two of you; Fili gives into you too easily.” He holds out his naked arm. “This is the last time I offer you this,” he says, tempering his voice, but the edge is still there. “Take it or starve.”

Fili doesn’t hear Kili’s reply. By Kili’s glum expression and the loud bang of the front door not just a moment later, he assumes that Kili turns Thorin down.

Fili’s just finished changing into something more comfortable to sleep in when Kili pushes open the door to his room, eyes downcast and a frustrated grimace pulling on his lips. Fili sits on the edge of the mattress and Kili takes the unspoken invitation to join him.

Kili is only slightly warm now; it’s been several days since the last time he’s fed and over time, Fili knows his body will grow colder and colder until it becomes corpse-like and Fili cannot stand that. He burns inside knowing that Kili’s turned down Thorin’s freely offered meal, but also, he feels lighter for it.

“I won’t hurt you,” Kili says, voice strong and filled with resolve.

“I know,” Fili replies. He pushes back a sleeve and offers up his arm, fully expecting Kili to take.

Kili’s eyes flash red, but that’s it; a fleeting discoloration and nothing more. He tugs Fili’s sleeve back down and smiles.

“No,” says Kili. “I won’t.”

==

10.

Fili is on edge every day Kili doesn’t feed from him. He notices the waterskins that Kili leaves lying around the house, but he never sees Kili drinking from them. Every day, he watches as Kili’s complexion becomes waxen and his skin grows cold to the touch. Meanwhile, Fili is stronger again. His cheeks are rosy with life and he’s able to spar with Dwalin again in the training grounds and help Thorin in the forge on the same day. He’s more vivacious than ever.

To stave off the cold, Kili crawls into bed with Fili and clings like he’s a dwarfling again, asking his big brother for shelter and protection. Fili gives it—he gives whatever it is that Kili needs.

“Why didn’t you take up Uncle’s offer?” Fili finds himself asking one early evening. He’s retired to bed for the night and Kili follows him. It breaks Fili’s heart that Kili refuses to go out as he used to during the nights; he says he has no need for the world aside from Fili, but that’s a lie. Fili knows that Kili misses the sunlight and the voices of other people, but is too terrified of what everyone is saying about him to go out there and prove them all wrong.

Kili shakes his head slowly.

“It didn't feel right,” Kili replies. “I wanted to, though. I really did. But I saw you and then—”

He stops abruptly and falls silent.

“And then?” Fili prods.

The next words Kili says are quiet, almost muffled from the way he has his head buried against Fili’s chest. “I love you,” he says.

Fili laughs and kisses the top of Kili’s head. “I love you too, little brother. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

Kili never says anything in response to that, but the hand that’s fisted in Fili’s shirt tightens its grip, wrinkling the soft material further. His shirt is going to be ruined in the morning and Fili lets him.

==

11.

“How do you track leeches?”

Balin scrutinizes him carefully, like he’s a problematic word in a very important document. Fili stands as straight and as still as he can, hoping his expression gives nothing away.

“If you’re thinking of going after the one that attacked your brother, give it up,” Balin says. “Your uncle and Dwalin have already tried.”

This is the first that Fili’s heard of it; perhaps it’s because they’ve failed is why he’s never told.

“It’s still out there then,” Fili says. “At least tell me how. You were a valiant warrior once, when the kingdom of Erebor still stood; you must know of a way to hunt them.”

Balin exhales slowly as he puffs away on his pipe. It’s midday, though it’s gradually getting colder and colder as the seasons change. Autumn is passing quickly and with it, any hopes of finding the thing before the frost sets in.

“Laddie,” Balin says, not unkindly. “Go home. Make sure your brother drinks the lamb blood. It’s better than nothing.”

It’s strange how Balin knows this and Fili voices his thoughts on the matter. All he gets is a humorless chuckle in reply before being politely shooed out the door.

==

12.

“We’re going hunting,” Fili declares. He peeks behind the curtain to look through the window; the sky is an overcast cloudy grey and the sun is a useless source of light in the early evening. It will go down soon and the moon will rise. It probably won’t even be seen through the clouds.

“What?” Kili asks. He’s still staring at Fili like he’s grown another head.

“For the leech. The one that turned you,” Fili says, annoyed. Kili hasn’t put on his coat or boots and his hair is still free of the silver clasp that normally secures it from his face. “Hurry up with your clothes.”

Kili tugs at Fili’s hands and it’s icy to the touch. “It’s going to be completely dark out soon. It won’t be safe,” he says.

“How else are you to come with me?” Fili asks because sometimes, his brother can be so stupid. “Besides, you can see in the dark. I know you can. You’ve brought home game before when there was nary a light in the sky. Don’t lie to me now, Kili.”

“Of course not,” says Kili, but he says it with the telling hitch in his voice. Fili growls with impatience.

“We don’t even know where to start!” Kili protests. “Fili, think this through. It’s not safe.”

“We need to do this,” Fili argues. “We have to.”

Kili shakes his head. “No, no, we don’t—”

Fili finds himself out of placidity; there is something that is not being said, a note that’s been passed around for everyone to read except for Fili. He snatches his hands out of Kili’s grasp.

“What are you not telling me?”

Kili winces, shrinking into himself. He’s taller than Fili, but not when he’s bowed like this. He stands shorter, smaller, and more fragile with his back bent and something within his spirit is broken. Fili blinks and sees before him a shadow of Kili, an imitation at its best. It’s really a corpse, reanimated, and everything suddenly becomes laughably hilarious. He’s tried so hard to save his brother, to keep Kili alive, but Kili’s already dead. Fili cannot save him, not anymore.

“Fili, please,” Kili pleads, desperate. “The man is still out there. I can hear him calling to me, telling me to take for myself so I won’t go hungry. I never listen. I won’t be a monster.” His eyes are bleak when they look up and there’s a strange fogginess in them, making his gaze seem unfocused. “He threatened you. He says that your blood must be sweet if I refuse to drink from anyone else. He listed to me all the things he would do to you if he caught you. The man is mad.”

“So it is a man of Men that is the leech,” Fili says, gleaning all the information that he can from Kili’s confession. “Why did you not say sooner?”

“Fili! I am not confident that I can protect you from him!”

“I can protect myself.”

Kili shakes his head. “I thought the same. He’s very strong.”

Fili snorts and diverts his attentions to another matter, one that’s more alarming. “You say he calls to you?”

“In the dead of nights, yes,” Kili replies, miserable. “Please, Fili. Brother. Don’t go.” He reaches out again and Fili takes his hands. Rubbing them fail to bring even the slightest spark of warmth back to them.

Leeches aren’t witches nor are they elves, able to see into the hearts of men. They have no abilities to speak into one’s mind as Kili says. “I know why you’re afraid,” Fili murmurs finally, breaking the strange silence that’s fallen over them. He’s wishes Kili would warm up. “You’re weak on animal blood. Feed from me instead.”

Kili’s eyes flicker. “No,” he says, staunch and stubborn. “I won’t.”

Fili has long ago decided that Kili can be a little bastard sometimes. He’s foolishly stubborn for no reason at all.

Fili lets go of Kili’s hands and grabs his throwing knife out of its holster in his vambrace. Kili startles, his eyes wide as he stares. There’s fear and resignation and Fili hates himself a little for making Kili feel that way. He cuts down into the palm of his non-dominate hand and offers it to Kili wordlessly. He drops the throwing knife on the floor and kicks it out of reach.

“Why?” Kili asks. He’s fighting with himself, the transparency of the conflict playing out in the coloration of his eyes. It’s grotesquely beautiful and Fili cannot look away.

It’s several moments before Fili can find his voice again.

“I can’t stand to see you suffering,” he manages to croak. “If you don’t want to hurt me, don’t hurt yourself.”

Kili blinks and his eyes go completely red, more vivid than Fili ever remembers it going. He takes Fili’s proffered hand and tilts it so the growing pool of blood in his palm tips over. Kili catches every droplet with a nimble tongue and licks over the bloody gash, intent of lapping up every bit he can. He keeps licking, even when the cut has finished bleeding, and he starts suckling on the skin around it. He doesn’t bite; he keeps his fangs away from the meaty part of Fili’s palm.

“Please,” Kili pleads, but what is he pleading for?

Fili drops his coat and bares his neck, but is entirely surprised by Kili cupping his face and kissing him. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I was...eaten by Aywas. *cough* Enjoy!

1.

They have always been close, closer than any sibling might be, but Fili had never questioned it. They aren’t so different from other families, as far as he can tell.

He and Kili had often gotten into fisticuffs when they were younger and occasionally now, they will still get into them when they disagree. They always make up in the end and when Fili sleeps at night, Kili is still the most precious person in the world to him.

He has never thought about Kili as a lover—he can’t even begin to think of him as one, and yet Kili is kissing him, sweet and tenderly.

“Kili,” he says against his brother’s mouth. The name comes out warped and more like a mumble, but Kili shrinks back like he’s been scalded by boiling water.

Fili understands the situation more than he wants to.

“Kili,” he says again and gestures at their only table, the one in the kitchen. He takes a seat and waits for Kili to join him. Kili is slow to move from where his back is pressed against the wall, but Fili waits anyway because there’s nothing else he can do. After an eternity, Kili inches over into the chair across from Fili and if possible, Fili’s certain that he’d be paler than he is already. Kili’s chewing unconsciously on his bottom lip and the red of his eyes have receded; his back is unnaturally straight and tense and he’s looking everywhere except at Fili.

They are brothers, he wants to say; this is wrong and he should instead go find a dwarven lass or lad that will have him. Many will gladly be his suitor; Kili is good looking with strong Durin features, unlike Fili with his flaxen hair and pale skin. He is well-loved and gets along with everyone.

But that’s the Kili of before, he supposes, and not the one before him now.

Fili doesn’t say any of it because Kili should already know all this. Instead, he asks: “Why?”

“Why what?” Kili snaps miserably. He has an arm leaning on the table, a finger working at deepening a scratch on the surface; his eyes are downcast and he still refuses to look at Fili.

“Why now?”

Kili’s eyes turn to him reluctantly. “You knew?”

“No, I didn’t,” Fili answers truthfully. Brothers don’t climb into each other’s beds, not at their age. Brothers don’t hold each other in the darkness of their rooms. Brothers are not so co-dependent that they refuse to live separate from each other. “But I suspected.”

A silent moment passes between them.

“You let me drink from you. You let me crawl into bed with you. You let me move in with you.” Kili’s words get louder and angrier. “Do you pity me?”

It is pity, Fili realizes belatedly. But it’s just one part of the whole story; he wants Kili to be himself again, to be loud and obnoxious and pick fights and _be Kili._ It’s been so long since Kili’s ensconced himself in a cocoon of fear and self-denial that Fili is at the end of his rope—he will do anything to anchor Kili to the world of the living. Yet, that is still only part of it and Fili doesn’t want to look at the remaining reasons all too closely.

“No,” he replies as truthfully as he can and Kili makes the most horrible of screeching noises as he launches into one of his yelling tantrums.

==

2.

Kili ignores Fili for the better part of a week and Fili lets him—until he realizes that the waterskins that Balin’s dropping off with them are just piling up in the kitchen and he goes to confront Kili for it.

Kili is in his room, curled up in bed. Sulking. He doesn’t so much as twitch when Fili forces the door open, but Fili knows that Kili is awake and listening. Fili takes a seat at the edge of the mattress, keeping a small distance between them. It’s an easy distance to breach, but only if Kili wants to. Fili doesn’t plan on moving.

“Stop playing dead,” Fili says. “You’re worrying Mother and Uncle, not to mention Misters Balin and Dwalin. They’ve been asking after you, you know. There’s only so many excuses that I can give them.”

Kili makes a noise, but otherwise doesn’t move a muscle.

Fili sighs.

“You can’t do this forever.”

“Leeches don’t age. For all you know, I can.”

“You would be the most childish leech recorded in history. I bet all the other leeches will mock you. How will those terrifying children’s tales go? Once upon a time, there was a leech that wouldn’t get out of bed—”

A pillow collides with Fili’s face and the bed bounces as Kili sits upright.

“Why do you not understand?” Kili bellows. “I didn’t ask for this! I don’t want to be one! How can you just sit there and-and laugh?”

“I want you to live!” Fili returns. “It doesn’t matter what you are—you are my brother and I cannot see you wasting away! You haven’t been drinking any of the waterskins in the kitchen and you haven’t come to me.”

Kili averts his eyes, but Fili catches the sight of bright red scleras anyway.

“You think I’m sick,” Kili says slowly. “That I’m wrong and disgusting.”

“I do not think that,” Fili replies. “Is it the voice in your head telling you this?”

The sullen silence in response is more than enough of an answer and Fili sighs again in the span of minutes. He fists a hand in the sheets over the bed and resolutely counts backwards from five.

“We will kill the bastard that did this to you,” Fili promises. He’s making plans again; the last time neither of them made it past the front door before devolving into an argument. “We will. I know it. But for now, you need to feed. Either from me or one of the waterskins, take your pick.”

Kili inches forward, eyes still downcast, but the reds of them are unmistakable and bright in the dimness of the room. He slides over to Fili with a guilty slant to his shoulders, mouth stubbornly closed against verbalizing his choice.

Fili removes his shirt—clean, white—and tosses it into the corner of the room.

He understands keenly that mixed within the red of bloodlust in Kili’s eyes is also a different kind of lust. It is why he’s Kili’s preferred meal, whether Kili is conscious of the fact or not.

“I do not think of you as sick or wrong or disgusting,” he says. His voice is strangely calm despite the cacophony stirring inside of him. “Neither do I think you are a monster or something to be locked away. You are my only brother and I care about you. I told you that if you didn’t want to hurt me, don’t hurt yourself.”

“Fili,” Kili whispers, his voice sounding far away. He reaches out and runs his fingertips down Fili’s cheek and Fili does his best not to flinch. Kili’s touch is ice cold.

“Drink,” Fili urges. “Feed. I’ve got enough blood for the both of us.”

==

3.

Neither of them brings up the kiss again. Not for a while.

==

4.

“You’ve been feeding him again,” Dwalin says, disappointment writ large upon his scowling features. He slams his practice sword violently against Fili’s own, knocking it out of Fili’s grip and spinning onto the floor. “You get weak and careless.”

Fili determinedly does not yell back and picks up his practice sword off the ground. “I was careless just there, but I am not weak.”

Dwalin snorts. “You are weak,” he says. “You coddle him; you can’t deny him his wants. He’s not ten anymore and he can make decisions on his own without his big brother. Or is that how it’s going to be for the rest of your life?”

Fili’s life, not Kili’s.

Fili pauses. Dwalin lunges forward with his sword and again, exactly like before, Fili’s goes spinning onto the floor.

“Go home,” Dwalin says with a deep sigh. He has one hand rubbing over his eyes, like he’s exhausted. It’s Fili that feels that way, but he’s not going to show it, least of all to Dwalin. Fili stands as tall and resolute as he can even with his fingers numb and without any strength. “Get some rest. We’ll start again in two days.”

==

5.

Fili is tired all the time now. He wakes up late in the mornings, long after the sun has risen and he’s always chilled in a way that leaves him wanting to curl under his thickest blankets and furs. When he gets to the kitchen, breakfast is usually made for him, but Kili is nowhere to be seen. They haven’t shared a bed since Kili’s last meal and Fili passed out on him. The two of them are doing some strange dance around each other and all Fili wants to do is throttle his brother.

Everything is alright, he wants to scream and yell, even though it’s not. He wants to make it better; he’s the big brother here, he should be depended upon to make things that are wrong right.

“Uncle’s going to be angry again,” Kili says.

Fili looks up from where he’s putting his dirty dishes into the basin. Kili’s leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest.

“Let him be angry,” Fili sighs.

Kili gets a strange look on his face. “You don’t look well. Are you sure you should be going to the forge?”

“If I don’t show up by lunchtime, you know he’ll come banging on the door. I don’t particularly want to deal with that right now.”

“I don’t think you should go,” Kili persists.

Fili’s starting to feel a headache pressing against the back of his skull, trying to worm its way through his eyes to explode his head. He bites down on his tongue and fetches his old coat. He can tell by the brightness of the sunlight leaking in through the blinds that it will be a warm day—strange weather for autumn, but he puts it on anyway. His tips of his fingers are numb when he does the buttons. The whole time, Kili watches noiselessly.

“I’ll be back later,” Fili says.

“Have a good day,” Kili replies.

Everything about that exchange is insincere, but Fili can’t bring himself to care.

==

6.

The warning bells at night ring loud and clear through the darkness, jolting Fili from a fitful sleep. He’s on his feet in an instant, rushing about trying to put his boots and warm cloak on. He’s just securing the scabbards of his twin blades to his back when Kili flings his door open.

“You are not going.”

Fili glares. “This is our chance. Your chance.”

“My chance at what?” Kili snarls. “To see you die?”

“I won’t die,” Fili snorts. “Now get out of my way.”

“No,” Kili snaps and tackles Fili around the middle.

By the time Fili manages to get out into the street, the leech is long gone, leaving behind two bloodless corpses that never comes back to life.

==

7.

“Laddie, a word?”

Balin’s voice is gentle and tempered, but Fili recognizes a lecture when he’s confronted like this.

He’s sweaty and tired and all he wants to do is go home, bathe, and sleep precisely in that order. Balin’s come out of his way to catch Fili before he gets home. He’s done something wrong again and the only reason Balin would approach him like this is because Thorin thinks Balin would be better suited for this conversation. The old codgers have been conspiring amongst themselves, Fili thinks viciously and immediately regrets it. He closes his eyes and sucks in a deep lungful of air.

“Yes?”

Balin smiles. “How are you faring?”

“Just fine,” he replies.

Balin’s smile doesn’t waver. “Let’s walk you home.”

Fili doesn’t bristle at that, but he does say, “I’m not ten, you know.”

“Ah, but I do remember you at ten.” Balin’s eyes twinkle with mirth as he leads the way down the road. “You were a handful, always doing things you shouldn’t have been doing. Both you and your brother. Do you remember the time you climbed up to the roof of the guard tower and couldn’t get back down? Thorin had half a mind to leave you up there as punishment.”

Fili colors at the memory; it’s hazy, but it’s there. He remembers wide, open skies and a terrifyingly long drop down and his mother yelling at him. He remembers Kili’s big brown eyes staring back at him from so far away and Thorin’s thunderous bellows that scared him even more than the potential fall. He thinks he may have cried. What he can’t recall is how he got back down.

“I know,” he says. “I was there.”

Balin laughs.

They lapse into silence and just as they’re several feet away from Fili’s front door, Balin stops.

“Don’t push yourself too hard. We all have eyes to see with.”

Fili chews on the inside of his mouth for a moment. “Please be straight with me, Mister Balin. I’d prefer you just tell me what’s on your mind.”

Balin sighs. “I—no, not just me, everyone—is worried about your health,” he says. “You’re growing weaker.”

“If this is about the damn line of Durin—”

“Fili.” Balin’s tone is sharp and Fili stills his tongue. “We are worried about you. Kili will be fine for as long as he has you, but as long as you’re with him, you’re in danger.”

Fili can feel the earlier anger springing up within him again. “He’s Kili. He’s my brother. I’m in no danger.”

“And he is dead. You should accept that sooner rather than later.”

“He is Kili and he is my brother and I will not hear such things said about him!” Fili roars. He bites down immediately on his lower lip at the explosion and looks away. “I am sorry for my rudeness, Mister Balin, but I am going home now. Good evening.” He tilts his head in a brusque bow and takes those several steps that lead up to his front door. He wrenches it open and slams it shut behind him. Balin doesn’t even try to stop him.

Kili is curled up on the sofa, glaring at a pile of waterskins on the floor.

“How many waterskins can one dwarf have?” Kili asks. “I’ve cleaned all of them out—there must be twenty at least. We’ll have to return them soon.”

Fili pinches the bridge of his nose. He doesn’t want to talk about Balin now.

“Soon,” he says and heads to the bath.

==

8.

“Why are you here?”

Thorin doesn’t bother looking up from inspecting the damaged halberd at his workbench. It looks like a simple enough fix to Fili’s eyes, but he knows that isn’t why Thorin’s not meeting his gaze.

“I work here,” Fili says. “With you.”

Thorin sighs, explosively, and sets the weapon down. He stares at his hands for a moment.

“Go home. Rest. And when you’re well again, feed your brother.”

Fili can feel his eyebrows jump up to his hairline. There’s a bee buzzing next to his ear and the world is warping around him, like he’s looking through curved glass.

“Uncle?”

“No one can stop you,” Thorin says. “We can advise against it, but the decision is ultimately yours and his. If you want to ruin yourself like this, then so be it!” He turns to Fili, expression dark and livid. Fili doesn’t think he’s ever seen Thorin so angry. “Leave! You’re no help here.”

Fili clenches his hand into a fist.

“You don’t understand,” he says through gritted teeth. “None of you do.”

He leaves. Thorin doesn’t stop him.

==

9.

“Found you.”

Fili opens his eyes to see Kili standing over him, the deep velvet blue of the night sky as his backdrop. They’re in the open glade that’s still within the town gates, but Fili shouldn’t have given into the sense of security of high walls and fallen asleep.

“Kili.”

Kili’s lips twitch at the sound of his name, but other than that, his face remains impassive. Fili yawns and sits up. There’s a crick in his neck and he’s still tired. He looks away from Kili and rises from the grass, patting down his clothes. There’s nothing clinging to him but a few dead blades of grass and crushed leaves.

“Why were you out here? Alone?”

“I can handle myself.”

Kili pushes himself into Fili’s personal space, forcing Fili to look up to meet his brother’s eyes. It’s such a shame that Kili’s immortalized as taller than Fili, but it’s not like several inches matters that much in the grand scope of things, he supposes. Fili resolutely doesn’t step back and tilts his head slightly to the side in a silent question.

“I came out looking for you!” Kili’s angry, understandably. His nostrils are flared and there’s a tightness to his jaws. “Uncle and Dwalin came by, but you weren’t home! They said that you should have been back hours ago! You don’t know how worried I was—how anyone was!”

“I apologize—”

“No!” Kili interrupts and grabs onto the front of Fili’s shirt. “Why are you doing this? Do you have a death wish? Tell me!”

Fili tries to pry Kili’s fingers off of his shirt, but they hold fast and clenches with even more strength when he tries.

“Let me go,” he says and he sounds weary even to his own ears. Kili glowers at him and only after a moment of careful scrutiny does he drop his hands.

“Please,” Kili says. “Fili. I don’t know what’s going through your head anymore. I can’t—I don’t know what you’re thinking. You’re going away. Tell me why you’re doing this, what’s happening?”

Fili steps around Kili, but is stopped by Kili moving to wall him back.

“I’m tired. I don’t want to have this discussion out in the open.”

For a moment, Kili looks as if he’ll relent, but his stubbornness chooses that moment to kick in. Kili crosses his arms over his chest and glares. Fili’s fought with him long enough to know that expression—Kili’s not going to budge until he gets what he wants and in the end, he always gets his way. If it isn’t Dis, then it’s Fili giving into Kili’s whims. This is a losing battle Fili’s fighting, he knows this, but he’ll fight it regardless.

“Will you move?” he snaps.

“No. Not until you talk to me.”

“What do you want to talk about?”

“Why do you let me take so much blood from you? I got you sick because of that! You already know how hard it is for me to control myself as a leech—”

“You are not!” Fili roars. “You may share some similarities with those things, but you’re not!”

“—and the leech hunt, I know you haven’t given up on that! Even with the two of us, it’s still too dangerous! I am already dead, but you’re still flesh and blood and he’s already killed me once! I can’t protect you, Fili—”

“I don’t need your protection!”

He turns away, but Kili grabs his shoulder and digs his fingers in. It’s painful and harsh, but Fili feels no heat coming from Kili’s palm and the shirt he’s wearing isn’t thick enough to block that out. It’s a light material, dirty and a bit charred from the days he’s spent in the forge, stained with sweat and splatters of blood from training sessions with Dwalin. Kili has one just as dirty and grimy as the one he’s wearing now, but Fili hasn’t seen it make an appearance in what feels like an age.

“And you pull something like this. Falling asleep out in the open when you know it’s not safe. What am I supposed to think? Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

“No! No.” Fili puts a hand to his temple. “Nothing like that.”

Kili’s expression softens and pulls Fili against him into a rough hug, his fingers digging tightly into Fili’s skin even through his clothes. “Everyone seems to think that you can’t say no to me, but that’s not true. It’s the other way around.”

Fili chuckles humorlessly and wraps his arms around Kili. “It’s both,” he says into Kili’s ear and he doesn’t miss the shudder that goes through Kili’s body.

He remembers that leeches, in order to enter any building, must be invited. There hasn’t been very many new folks passing through the town recently, half in part due to the changing of seasons and half due to rumors of a leech scaring everyone off. Fili should have known that if a leech is still around, he won’t find it loitering around the center of town. He’ll find it near the outskirts.

In a tree, just several feet away, a pair of red eyes stares back from within the shade.

Why didn’t he bring his weapons with him? Why’s he so ill-prepared? And Kili—he’s unarmed, just wearing a light coat over his clothes. Neither of them has adequate protection. They have to get out of here.

“Kili,” he says, the sounds sticking to his throat like glue. “Kili. Run.”

“Wha—”

He grabs Kili by the hand, dashing as fast as he can back towards the center of town. His heartbeat is thudding in his ears, drowning out Kili’s confused yells as they sprint down the roughly hewn road.

They nearly make it back when Kili’s hand is jerked from his grip. He spins around to look and sees his brother struggling against a foul, twisted shape of a man. Kili’s dangling from a rough grip on his throat, the tips of his boots just barely scraping the ground as the leech salivates over him. Its eyes are so red, they glow an unearthly ruby color in the night and it takes all of Fili’s courage to run back to Kili.

“Let him go!” he yells and his voice sounds nothing like his own. The thing doesn’t seem to have heard him and just squeezes down on Kili’s neck tighter, digging long and dirty fingernails into his flesh. It’s trying to kill him, Fili realizes.

He screams something that is both a battle cry and not and charges. He’s a trained dwarf in the art of combat, even if hand-to-hand isn’t his strong suit, but he knows the fundamentals of how to bring down an opponent larger than himself, especially one that’s stationary and isn’t even paying him any attention.

He kicks the leech’s kneecap out of alignment and deals a blow to the soft spot of the gut. The thing reels back in surprise, tossing Kili to the ground with an angry snarl.

“I’ll kill you,” the leech says and the voice from the thing is so strangely smooth and harmonious, completely contradicting its hideous nature and looks. The clothes it once wore hangs as nothing more than rags from its limbs and as it limps towards Fili, he catches sight of tarnished metal peeking out from a rotted leather jerkin. It’s a small knife.

There’s his chance, Fili thinks.

“How do you turn back?” Fili barks. “How do you undo it?”

The leech pauses and blinks. He reaches out with a hand, but Fili backs away. Kili’s getting up from the ground, a dark, angry expression on his face.

“I don’t know,” the leech says. “I never found a cure. I don’t think there is one.” It reaches out again and Fili moves farther back away from it. “I’m hungry, dwarf, and you’re already trying my patience.”

It stretches and presses a hand to its knee; Fili doesn’t need to hear the pop to know it’s forced the dislocated kneecap back into place. It starts towards Fili with large and quick strides and out here, at the edge of town, there’s nowhere to run. The leech is faster than him and they both know it. He has to make a stand here. He has to kill the thing that took away his brother.

Fili stops running.

“I will kill you for hurting my brother,” he says, meaning every word even though he has none of his armor and none of his weapons. All he has are his bare hands and he knows this is the only chance he’ll ever have of taking down the monster.

“That thing?” the leech turns to Kili, who freezes from where he’s trying to sneak up on it. The leech shakes its head. “Dwarf, that is also a leech. It’s not your brother. It looks like him and talks like him, but he’ll gladly bleed you dry. Perhaps I should kill him and save you the heartache of doing it yourself.” It smiles and every nerve in Fili’s body screams at him to move. He’s not fast enough.

The thing rounds on Kili, grabbing a thick fistful of hair at the base of Kili’s skull, and yanks. It sends Kili falling off balance and the leech lifts him up by the hair with no visible effort.

Kili’s yelling, though his voice is hoarse from earlier, and he lashes out with fists and feet. The leech shoves him off balance again and this time, lets his knees buckle to the ground and it takes the chance to stand upon Kili’s legs.

Time slows down for Fili; he can see the wide-eyed terrified look of confusion on Kili’s face as it slowly dawns on him what’s happening. The leech’s hands are holding his head in an iron grip and his whole body has been forced to the ground by the weight of the leech standing on his calves.

Fili makes it, tackling the leech from behind. It’s only enough to get it to stumble, but at least it’s not pinning Kili down anymore.

“Kili! Stand up!”

A hand grabs Fili’s shoulder, roughly turning him around and all Fili can smell is the horrid, acrid scent of decay as he’s brought close to the leech’s reach. He does his best to lunge for the knife at the man’s belt and he grabs it successfully, the handle feeling like a godsend when his whole body goes numb and his fingers drop the knife without his permission.

He hears rather than feels the bite. Kili’s screaming somewhere to the side, but it’s drowned out by the noise of bone and tendon snapping.

The leech isn’t just drinking from him—it’s eating him. The bite’s crushed his clavicle and there’s a bloody gap where the rest of his neck should be.

He falls to the ground, unable to move, unable to speak; he can just gasp pitifully for breath and somehow, he knows Kili’s gotten his hands on the knife.

Good. Good. That’s good. He’s armed now, at least with something. Kili will kill it. Kili will live. Fili has faith in him.

==

10.

There’s sobbing. Someone’s crying.

It’s a cry that he hasn’t heard in years.

“You don’t understand! You never understood!”

At first there is silence, then, someone answers in a deep, somber voice.

“Kili, it’s been two days. Let him go. If he was coming back, he would have by now.”

“He will! He’s late, that’s all!”

“Kili. Lad, nephew. Please. Please let him go. For your own good.”

Something next to him moves, jostling him. It’s Kili, but that’s all he knows. He can’t feel his limbs and neither can he move them. His voice won’t work and it’s like he’s trapped in his own body, only able to hear what’s happening.

Kili’s sobbing harder, but the sound is muffled, like he’s crying against something or someone.

“Why, Uncle?” Fili hears. “Why won’t he come back? Why did I become a leech if I can’t even bring him back?”

“I don’t know,” says Thorin. “I’m sorry.”

==

 11.

The key to waking him up was blood. It required just a drop, but it instantly jolted his body into motion. Fili still isn’t sure what happened, but he remembers through a bloody haze that he had been on his deathbed and was being dressed for his funeral. Kili had been there for certain; he had restrained Fili until Thorin arrived. He doesn’t remember feeding from Thorin, though he definitely remembers the heavy hand from Dwalin pulling him off his uncle.

“I thought I had failed you,” Kili says.

It is the first evening that Fili’s spending as an unnatural creature, but he doesn’t particularly feel any different from before. He is sitting up in bed with Kili draped over his lap like an overgrown puppy. It’s in the deep, dark hours of night and no torches or candles have been lit in his room; he finds that leeches have better night vision than he previously thought. The ability to see in the dark is a small delight that he took pleasure in for the first few hours.

“You can never fail me,” Fili says, quietly.

He catches Kili peeking up at him and brushes away the stray hairs obscuring Kili’s face. Kili’s eyes are bright red. He wonders what his own looks like.

“I love you,” Kili whispers and his grip on Fili’s shirt tightens. He closes his eyes and moves even closer, as if trying to meld their bodies into one. “I love you.”

Fili raises his head to look at the ceiling and it isn’t until he hears the faint crowing of a rooster does he look back to Kili, who for all intents and purposes seem to have fallen asleep. He’s not asleep, but Fili will let it slide. He runs his fingers through Kili’s hair and wonders idly what Thorin would say. It doesn’t matter, not in the long run most likely, and Fili doesn’t intend to make this short lived.

He bows his head to press a kiss on Kili’s temple, noting the tiniest of shivers rocking against him and whispers into his little brother’s ear, tenderly, softly, and thinks very hard about the words and what they mean.

“I love you too.”


End file.
